OnPolitics Today: 'We'll stop it,' FBI agent said of Trump election

'He's not ever going to become president, right?'

Author:
Joshua Hafner, USA TODAY

Published:
5:36 PM CDT June 14, 2018

Updated:
7:51 PM CDT June 14, 2018

A Justice Department official's newly released report found ex-FBI chief James Comey showed no bias when investigating Hillary Clinton's emails in 2016, but it's two text messages in the report that have generated the most buzz.

"(Trump's) not ever going to become president, right?" wrote Lisa Page, an FBI lawyer, in a text to agent Peter Strzok just months before the presidential election. "No. No he's not," Strzok said, per the report. "We'll stop it."

And while the report by Inspector General Michael Horowitz concluded their political views hadn't "directly affected" their work, it slammed the texts as "antithetical to the core values of the FBI.”

Comey come down

The report — a 568-page tome — found Comey showed no bias while investigating Clinton's use of a private email server. That said, the report said he did step outside procedural norms, which "negatively impacted the perception of the FBI and the department as fair administrators of justice." Comey himself called the conclusions "reasonable, even though I disagree with some." White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders said the report "reaffirms" Trump, who's lambasted the FBI as corrupt. Dive deeper into the Comey report, and how everyone's reacting.

Live from New York, a lawsuit for Trump's foundation

New York's attorney general wants to shut Trump's charity down with a new lawsuit filed Thursday that says the Trump Foundation pushed Trump's self-interests and boosted his presidential bid. The charity's board hadn't met in 19 years, the lawsuit claims, and the foundation funded everything from settlements against Trump golf clubs to ads for Trump hotels. A 2016 foundation fundraiser was directed by his campaign staff and featured checks with his campaign slogan on them — one of myriad alleged violations of law. Trump on Thursday slammed "sleazy New York Democrats," promising, "I won’t settle this case!"

A strange salute

Trump salutes in footage broadcast on North Korean state media.

KRT

President Trump saluted a North Korean general during his summit with Kim Jong Un this week, an unusual honor for an officer of a despotic regime. The salute, broadcast by North Korea's state media, came as Trump appeared to meet Kim's delegation in Singapore. It's unusual for presidents to salute foreign military members, NBC News noted. And that would be especially true for those of totalitarian states like North Korea. Critics claimed Trump's gesture gave North Korea more reason to claim legitimacy on the world stage, while others called it a reflexive, if unfortunate, snafu.